


tell me when it kicks in

by llyrical



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Bad Decisions, Dream Pack, Excessive Drinking, Kavinsky is his own warning, M/M, Recreational Drug Use, Street Racing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-21
Updated: 2016-08-21
Packaged: 2018-08-10 02:24:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7826557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/llyrical/pseuds/llyrical
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And it’s ridiculous, because it’s not like he <i>misses</i> Proko, or anything. Proko is his dream thing, his possession. That’s all. K’s life is thrown off-kilter by his absence, just like it would be if he were to lose the Mitsu or his favorite pair of shoes. </p>
<p>That’s all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tell me when it kicks in

**Author's Note:**

> So after like four days of screaming to [gvnseys](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gvnseys) about being Kavinsky trash, I finally managed to sit down long enough to finish something. So this is dedicated to her for being a real trooper and a great friend. 
> 
> I wanted to write about K unintentionally pining because K seems like the last character in the world to pine for something, so. Yeah. I asked like six people to tell me about cocaine before I wrote this. I'm exhausted. 
> 
> You can find me on tumblr at [Pokespec](https://pokespec.tumblr.com) or my Raven Cycle sideblog, [Prokopinskys!](https://prokopinskys.tumblr.com)
> 
> **Warnings for underage drinking, drug use, general bad decisions, mentions of abuse, and reckless driving/car accidents.**

There were several times a year that Joseph Kavinsky spiralled down into something that was somehow worse than the person he was the rest of the year. 

One of these times was Father’s Day, an unwelcome reminder of a person who Kavinsky had spent years trying to forget. It wasn’t that his father had been abusive; it was just that one time ten-year-old Kavinsky had spilt milk on the kitchen floor and his dad had held a gun to his head and ordered him to lick it up. 

Another one of these occasions was any time that Prokopenko went out of town. 

Like him, Proko’s family situation was… _interesting._ From what K had been able to learn through drunken four-in-the-morning conversations, Proko grew up in a household that was not abusive, but not loving, either. While K’s father paid him too much attention, Proko’s parents paid him none at all. He’d been raised by nannies, most likely, and his parents had shipped him off to Aglionby the second they had the chance so that they didn’t have to deal with him anymore. 

Kavinsky grew up in a mansion-turned-drug den and was starved to prove a point. Prokopenko grew up in just a plain mansion, but it was kept cold and lonely and starved Proko for affection. 

For some things, K could thank Proko’s parents. 

Still, despite their lack of interest in their son’s life, something that they _did_ care about was the way they were viewed in the public eye. Just like the parents of most Aglionby students, Mr. and Mrs. Prokopenko had a reputation to uphold, and that meant making it look like they had a functional, nuclear family who spent time together. 

And that entailed taking Proko on forced vacations to Europe, to Egypt, to the Caribbean. They’d pull him out of school a week before winter break and return him a week after the second semester started. With Aglionby’s strict rules of attendance, K imagined it could only be managed with generous bribes. The fact that the library had the Prokopenko name on it hadn’t escaped anybody’s attention. 

In December of their junior year, when Proko leaves for a month-long trip to London (“Why the fuck would we want to go to _London_ of all places in the dead of winter, Jesus fuck.”), Joseph Kavinsky once again begins to spiral. 

It’s a slow progression, sort of. Proko leaves right before finals week, and K doesn’t have enough time to focus on his absence. As much as he doesn’t give a fuck about Aglionby, he also doesn’t want to get kicked out (because that would require starting a new school and bringing his entire pack with him, and that’s just too much work), and that means passing finals. 

But then finals are over, school is out for the semester, and the Kavinsky household feels too empty without Prokopenko. 

And it’s ridiculous, because it’s not like he _misses_ Proko, or anything. Proko is his dream thing, his possession. That’s all. K’s life is thrown off-kilter by his absence, just like it would be if he were to lose the Mitsu or his favorite pair of shoes. 

That’s all. 

 

“Do you think I drink more when Proko’s gone?” K asks. He’s kind of slurring, which is a feat. He thinks he’d started the night with beer, if the pile of empty cans of PBR at his feet are any indicator, but at some point he’d finished off an entire bottle of wine and is now drinking straight from a bottle of whiskey. Somewhere in the back of his mind, statistics about BACs are running a marathon.

“You drink enough for both you _and_ Proko when he’s gone,” Jiang says dryly, not taking his eyes off the TV. He and Skov are playing some racing game that Kavinsky tried to get in on, only to find that his fine motor skills are a bit less fine than usual at the moment. 

Kavinsky is on the floor, slumped against the recliner, while the other three are pressed together on the couch. If Proko were here, K would make him blow him, maybe, just for something to do. 

Everything is so fucking _boring_ without Proko here.

He takes another swig. At some point, the whiskey became disgusting. At an earlier point, it’d stopped burning his throat. 

K traces his fingers over his inner wrist, where the skin is red and blotchy and raised. He’d let Jiang give him another stick-and-poke earlier, a slightly tipsy decision that he’ll probably regret in the morning but forget about by the afternoon. It’s the shaky outline of a simplistic knife. He can’t decide if he likes it or not, but the skin stings like hell when he presses his thumb against it, and it’s a welcome feeling because at least it’s _something_.

“When’s Proko coming back?” he asks, dropping the whisky bottle down by his side and dropping his head back against the chair, letting his eyes slip closed. 

“January tenth,” Swan and Jiang answer in unison. Their tone, slightly annoyed and slightly amused, makes K feel like he’s asked already. Maybe several times.

He cracks open an eye, shooting them an irritated glance. “I’m just ready to have more than _you_ assholes for conversation.” It comes out a bit more rushed and defensive than he intended. 

This doesn’t go over anyone’s head. Jiang snickers. “ _You miss Proko,_ ” he says, slightly sing-songy. 

K throws the bottle at his head. It misses by two feet and shatters against the wall.

 

K spends Christmas alone. 

Skov had promised to spend the holiday with his grandmother, and Jiang made the hour-drive out of town to meet up with his family. Kavinsky still doesn’t know anything about Swan’s family, but he assumes that he, too, is spending Christmas the traditional way. 

Proko is five hours ahead of him in London, and he texts K at seven o’clock on Christmas Eve night, in all caps, _‘MERRY CHRISTMAS K DON’T BE A GRINCH.’_

It’s just another day in the Kavinsky household. He hasn’t seen his mother in over a week, though he’s relatively sure that she’s just holed up in her bedroom and hasn’t died yet. 

K celebrates by drinking an entire bottle of Fireball and swallowing a handful of prescription anti-depressants that he bought off of a freshman. 

At night, he goes out and drives until the Mitsu gets low on gas, revelling in the empty streets and the chilled air and the Christmas trees up in people’s windows. He aches to race someone, anger hitting him at the idea that he’s the only one without something to do tonight. He doesn’t give a shit that he doesn’t have a family to spent Christmas with; he’s more bothered by the fact that he’s second in the eyes of his boys. The pack _is_ his family, and they’re not even here.

When the gas light comes on, he floors it. 

 

**TO: Proko  
1:23am**   
_heyy mofo y arent u home yet its too quite her_

**FROM: Proko  
1:23am**   
_how drunk are you_

**TO: Proko  
1:24am**   
_m like 10 shots in no t very_

**FROM: Proko  
1:25am**   
_pls don’t get alcohol poisoning when i’m not there to take you to the hospital_

**TO: Proko  
1:28am**   
_fight me_

**FROM: Proko  
1:29am**   
_go to sleep, k_

**TO: Proko  
1:29am**  
 _sleep is for the weak_

**FROM: Proko  
1:30am**   
_y’know for a dreamer you don’t sleep very much_

**TO: Proko  
1:31am**   
_yknow for a dream thing you dont know how to shut the fuk up_

 

“K,” Jiang drawls slowly, dragging it out into two syllables, and though it’s said in a reprimanding tone, Kavinsky also knows Jiang well enough to know that he doesn’t actually give a fuck. 

It’s New Year's Eve and they’re in K’s basement, listening to something that sounds slightly cultural and slightly techno. 

K ignores him in lieu of snorting another line of coke off the bar. He stays with his head bent over the counter as he waits for it to kick in, then throws his head back immediately after, hit with a wave of nausea and dizziness and something that makes him feel too _alive_ to ignore. 

He pinches the bridge of his nose and rears back, stumbling the slightest on his way over to the couch. He ends up pitching himself over the arm, sprawling out across Swan’s lap and landing with his cheek pressed against Skov’s thigh. Even without looking up, he knows that Skov is rolling his eyes before he begins to card a hand through K’s hair. 

Kavinsky rolls over, kicking Swan in the process, and stretches his arms out above his head. “Let’s drive,” he says, and the words come out a lot louder than he anticipated, sounding like an announcement. 

From across the room, he sees Jiang’s skeptical look. “You okay to race?” 

Of course he is. He feels fucking _great._

He rolls off the couch, only halfway-catching himself before he falls to the ground. When he makes it to the bottom of the staircase, his boys still haven’t moved from their seated positions, and he throws his arms up. “Come on, you fucking pussies,” he crows, “let’s go fuckin’ live.”

 

Flying down the strip at ninety, his blood rushing in his ears, he thinks about Prokopenko and how his rearview mirror feels empty with the headlights of only three cars, Proko’s Golf leaving a gaping absence. 

Things would just be better if Proko was here, is all. Less boring. 

One hand leaves its resting position on his thigh to turn the knob on the stereo, blaring the music until he can feel the vibrations in the steering wheel and his head pounds. (It’s playing a CD that Proko made him last summer. He thinks it’s Kpop.) The air con is going at full blast despite the cold night outside; still, his skin feels too warm. 

His high has warn off and he’s hit the wall hard, half-wishing he hadn’t left and that he was back home doing another line. Instead, he leans over to pop open the glove compartment, tugging out a bottle of vodka he’d kept stashed. 

He needs both hands to open the bottle; as he steers with his knees, the Mitsu swerves precariously. The liquor burns like fire on its way down his throat and settles warmly in his stomach. He takes three swigs before his throat hurts too much to swallow any more, and as he drops the bottle on the passenger set, the world swims around him. 

He lowers his speed and pulls an illegal U-turn to head back in the other direction, nearly skimming the curb of the sidewalk in the process. Three cars rush by him, slowing drastically to follow. 

Heading back into town, Kavinsky slows to reasonable speed as he comes upon another car. It only takes him half a second to recognize it: a charcoal BMW that’s belonged to Ronan Lynch since the death of his father several months prior. 

K pulls up next to him and revs his engine. 

Proko had asked him, before he left, not to race with Lynch while he was gone. It always put K in a bad mood, he said, and _you know how you get when I’m gone._ Whatever the fuck that was supposed to mean. 

Kavinsky rolls down his window and turns down the music. 

He makes an obscene hand gesture at Lynch, motioning for him to roll down his passenger side window. When he does, an annoyed expression on his face already, Kavinsky leers at him. “Happy fuckin’ New Year, Lynch!” 

The light turns green. K tears off. 

For a second, he doesn’t think Lynch will follow suit - K knows that Dick Gansey keeps him on a tight leash and doesn’t approve of racing, especially not with K. But after half a second, he takes the bait, the BMW catching up to the Mitsu and tearing ahead. 

Kavinsky grins and presses his foot to the floor. 

There’s always a thrill in this, in feeling his control over a three-point-five-thousand pound vehicle. In watching the needle on the speedometer climb, climb, climb. 

The Evo pulls ahead, a feat made possible only by the fact that it’s a dream thing. He delights in the image of Lynch’s headlights in his rearview, flipping the mirror up when Lynch flicks his brights on. _Asshole._ Somewhere in the distance, he can also see the lights of the rest of his pack, who will probably idle until he loops his way back. 

The music continues to filter out of the stereo, some pretty boy singing in Korean with the occasional English word thrown in. The wind from his rolled-down window has managed to knock his hat off, and it’s landed somewhere in the backseat. 

The Mitsu roars as he fights to keep his lead, irritation settling in when the BMW once again catches up with him. K shifts in his seat and sees stars at the movement, head spinning a bit. He tries to focus on the lines of the road, but they’re shaking from the other side of his sunglasses. 

His eyes flick over to the liquor on the passenger seat and he tries to remember how much he’d already had to drink before they’d gone out. 

He manages to gain the lead once more, and this time, Lynch falls back. Maybe he’s accepted that he won’t win, or maybe he’s just giving up. Still feeling a bit woozy, K risks looking over his shoulder to see if he can get a glimpse of Lynch behind the wheel-

-and then he’s registering the front tire catching in a deep pothole and the car shaking and then there’s a sound louder than the music and then he’s _upside down_ and the seatbelt is biting into his chest and the music _stops_ and K is only vaguely aware of splintered glass and something wet on his face and _pain_ and then-

Nothing. 

 

He doesn’t dream. He’s loosely aware of the fact that he’s not conscious but he doesn’t _dream_ , and being rendered dreamless is the same as being rendered powerless. 

When he awakes it’s not slowly, like a lazy Sunday morning. It’s the same way he usually comes out of intense nightmares: suddenly, with his heart pounding hard enough that it feels about ready to leap out of his chest. The room is bright and he immediately pinches his eyes back closed, jerking a bit and attempting to pop his neck. Every bone in his body feels _stiff_. 

“K,” a voice says, immediately followed by a pause and then, “Hey, dumbass, are you actually awake or not?” 

“Proko.” His voice comes out hoarse and rough, and not in the just-sucked-a-dick-and-it’s-kinda-hot kind of way. When he forces his eyes open again, they don’t immediately focus. He blinks, glances around the room, and says: “Oh, fuck me.”

“Maybe after your arm heals,” Proko says dryly, lifting an eyebrow. Kavinsky lets his eyes focus on his dream-thing. Proko’s in a chair next to K’s hospital bed - his _hospital bed_ , Jesus fuck, Kavinsky doesn’t end up in hospitals, he’s _Kavinsky_ \- with his elbows resting on the edge of the cot. His bleached-blonde hair is sticking up in several spots and the circles under his eyes are darker than usual. He looks painfully sober, and like he’s trying way too hard to cover up his stress. 

Kavinsky tries to stretch, to curl his fingers and his toes and regain some feeling in his limbs, and pain shoots up his left arm at the movement. He scowls down at the sling that his arm is in, shaking it despite the pain. It wakes him up a bit more, and he uses this to make himself sit up. 

Proko doesn’t tell him not to move, probably because he knows that K doesn’t take orders from him. He still looks mildly annoyed, but Kavinsky’s sure it’s probably to cover up his worry. Proko is like that. 

As feeling returns to his fingertips, he raises his right hand to his face, almost laughing at how absurd the entire situation feels. In his years of reckless drinking and drug-taking and driving and dreaming, he’s never ended up in a fucking hospital bed. 

“Your face is fucked,” Prokopenko says suddenly, and K had noticed that, because every spot he touches on his face feels like it’s been hit by a baseball bat. When K doesn’t immediately respond, Proko adds, “It looks better this way.”

“Fuck you,” K snaps, and Proko grins. There’s a bandage on Kavinsky’s forehead but they didn’t shave any part of his head, or anything, so it must not have been that serious. “What day is it?”

“Still New Years,” Proko answers, then glances down at his phone. “The second, now, actually. It’s midnight. You’ve been out for a day.” As K mulls this over, Proko mutters, half to himself, “Fuck, I shoulda told you it was 2025, or something.”

He’s been out for a _day_? Christ. He only vaguely remembers racing Lynch and flipping the Mitsu, but it feels like it just happened. That’s what dreamless sleep does to you, he supposes. 

(Part of his brain is also thinking about the fact that it’s midnight and that’s _definitely_ after hospital visiting hours. Still, he’s not the slightest bit surprised that Proko has managed to still be here.)

“Shit, is that long enough to count as a coma?” he asks, picking at a scab that’s already formed on his face. He isn’t concerned about the undeniably unfixable damage to the car, knowing he has a fairground filled with a hundred more replacements. He’s not worried about the legal ramifications, either; money exists for a reason, and sometimes that reason is to pay off cops. 

Proko’s lips twitch. “I don’t think so.” He yawns, stretching in a way that makes his shirt ride up. “They said you’ve been up a few times today, but you prob’ly wouldn’t remember it because of the drugs.”

It takes Kavinsky a second to realize that Proko means the drugs the hospital gave him, and not his recreational ones. 

And then Kavinsky realizes that Proko’s words imply that he hasn’t been here all day, and _then_ Kavinsky remembers that Proko was in London the last time he checked. 

K sits up more, drawing his knees up to his chest before changing his mind and sitting cross-legged instead (he recognizes, vaguely, that he’s probably pretty lucky that his legs didn’t snap in the crash). “You ditched your parents,” he comments. It’s as neutral of a statement as he can manage. 

Proko shoots him a dirty look. “You got in a fuckin’ _crash_ , K,” he says. “I wasn’t just gonna keep playing tourist.” 

Kavinsky gives him a Look, and his expression softens a bit. Glancing around as if someone was going to enter the room and catch him spilling his emotions, Proko lowers his voice and continues, “I was worried about you.”

“That’s fucking gay.”

“You’re one to talk.”

Kavinsky gives a flirtatious smirk, and it makes Proko burst out laughing. K realizes half a second too late that it’s probably because the smirk looks ridiculous on his currently fucked-up face. 

When the moment has passed, Proko visibly grows serious. He leans forward on his elbows, biting at the backs of his knuckles. It’s an idle habit that K is pretty certain he picked up from Swan.

“K,” he says, and he doesn’t need to say anything more. There are so many things conveyed by just that single letter and the iciness of Proko’s clear eyes. It says, _You know how I feel about you driving after having that much to drink._ It says, _You know what happened last time._ It says, _You may have been able to replicate me, but nobody can replace you._

He says, “I don’t want to be picking you up a morgue next time, jackass.”

K rolls his eyes. His head hurts, a dull ache in every part of his brain. He needs drugs, and he’s not sure what kind. 

“So stop leaving.” It comes out sounding a lot more serious, a lot more intentional, than Kavinsky wanted. He inwardly cringes at his own vulnerability. 

Proko examines him carefully, looking like he wants to comment on that but knowing better than to test him. Instead, his face twists into something mischievous and he says, “Come on, let’s get you out of here. I texted Skov. They’re waiting out front.” 

“Am I allowed to leave?” K’s injuries don’t seem to be too major - just the broken arm and some bruises and cuts everywhere - and he doesn’t exactly have a history with hospitals, but he can’t imagine that they wouldn’t want to keep him overnight for examination. He’s sure he’s got a massive concussion, and if he ever slept in more than fifteen minute intervals anyways, someone would probably have to continue waking him to make sure he doesn’t die in his sleep. 

Proko smirks. “No.” 

A grin creeps onto K’s face. When he swings his legs over the side of the bed, Proko is on his feet at once, fingers moving to grip K’s chin lightly and pull him into a kiss. 

“Let’s go.”


End file.
